Thursday, June 25, 2015

"IN KETTEN was a short-lived band existing from early 1994 until mid 1995, while three members of ABSURD - DMD (vox/guitars), JFN (drums) and CHS (bassguitar) - were incarcerated in the county jail of Erfurt (Thuringia/Germany). There, a local public charity sponsored music instruments to inmates thus they could rehearse and even play live (in front of other inmates) for recreational purposes. Since it was out of question to play as ABSURD, after the band was all over the newspapers and TV-channels for first-degree murder at that time, the camouflage of IN KETTEN was conceived for the sake of rehearsing and recording ABSURD-songs too.

IN KETTEN played cover songs first and foremost; even though DMD sometimes wrote a new lyric like he did for ENDSTUFE's "Winter in der BRD", for instance. Other songs, like "Mourning Soul", were "dual-used" for ABSURD and IN KETTEN alike. Only a few songs, like "Ein letzter Kuss", were conceived for IN KETTEN exclusively.

IN KETTEN played five shows behind bars, the final one to take place at the JVA Ichtershausen, a prison for juvenile offenders not far away from Erfurt, in June 1995. That one was recorded on video. While the video has been lost for all we know, the audio was preserved (Thank you, R.N., for keeping it safe!) and eventually remastered as to make this concert, in it's entirety, available to those interested in the history and biography of ABSURD. As they might know, various songs from this concert have been used elsewhere in the years past: "Mourning Soul" as bonus on "Thuringian Pagan Madness"-TapeEP or "Verlassen" on the Split-EP with HELDENTUM, for instance.

Shortly after this concert took place, the line-up of IN KETTEN (aka ABSURD) was disbanded and scattered across three different prisons in Thuringia. Hence IN KETTEN never reformed, nor did ABSURD with that "classic" line-up for that matter.

Saturday, June 20, 2015

"Remer played a leading role in the formation of the postwar "Socialist Reich Party," which, after winning 16 seats in a state parliament, was banned in 1952. Remer than lived in exile for several years in Egypt and Syria. He also wrote two books, including "Conspiracy and Treason Around Hitler" (Verschwörung und Verrat um Hitler), a memoir and study reviewed by H. Keith Thompson in the Spring 1988 Journal.

As a featured speaker at the Eighth (1987) Institute for Historical Review Conference, Remer spoke on "My Role in Berlin on July 20, 1944." (His address was published in the Spring 1988 Journal, and is available on both audio- and video-tape from the IHR.)

In October 1992 a German court in Schweinfurt sentenced him to 22 months imprisonment for "popular incitement" and "incitement to racial hatred" because of allegedly anti-Jewish "Holocaust denial" articles that had appeared in five issues of his tabloid newsletter, Remer Depesche. The judges in the case flatly refused to consider any of the extensive evidence presented by Remer's attorneys. (See the March-April 1993 Journal, pp. 29-30, and the May-June 1994 Journal, pp. 42-43.)

To avoid imprisonment, in February 1994 Remer sought exile in Spain. (See the July-August 1995 Journal, pp. 33-34.) German authorities sought his extradition, but Spain's highest court rejected these requests on the basis that Remer's "thought crime" was not illegal in Spain. Nevertheless, until the final weeks of his life, German authorities persisted in their efforts to extradite the dying octogenarian so that he could be imprisoned in Germany.

Many of the numerous newspaper reports that have appeared about Remer over the years have contained demonstrable falsehoods. For example, he has repeatedly, and inaccurately, been referred to as a former "SS man" or "SS officer." In fact, he was never even a National Socialist party member.

Newspapers also reported that Remer "denied the murder of Jews" or "declared that no Jews were murdered under the National Socialist regime." Actually, Remer pointed out, "I have never denied that Jews were killed during the Third Reich, but have only disputed the figures of Jews who died in Auschwitz and the alleged method of killing" (that is, in gas chambers).

In challenging the gassing claims, Remer cited the various forensic studies of the alleged gas chambers at Auschwitz, particularly the investigations carried out by German chemist Germar Rudolf and American gas chamber specialist Fred Leuchter.

The Remer case points up the strange and even perverse standards that prevail in Germany today. Although his "crime" was a non-violent expression of opinion, to dispute claims of mass gassings in wartime concentration camps is regarded in today's Germany as a criminal attack against all Jews, who enjoy a privileged status there.

More than half a century after the end of the Third Reich and the Second World War, Germans are ceaselessly exhorted to "never forget" the anti-Jewish measures of the Hitler era, to atone for what is called the most terrible crime in history, and to regard themselves as a nation of criminals and moral misfits. As a further expression of the country's "national masochism," the July 1944 conspirators are officially venerated, while outstanding wartime combat heroes and selfless patriots such as Remer are dishonored.

Particularly in Germany, the struggle on behalf of historical truth is not merely an academic question -- it is an issue of national survival.

If Germany were ever to find itself in another major war, it would be suicidal stupidity to cite as role models for its soldiers and officers the individuals who, at a time of national emergency, tried to assassinate the nation's leader and overthrow the government in a murderous putsch.

Every nation with a healthy survival instinct naturally venerates, particularly in time of war, individuals of exemplary self-sacrifice, patriotism, and heroism -- men of the caliber of Otto Ernst Remer."

Sunday, June 14, 2015

Another visit in Mesogaia. Shorty after the previous one. The days that followed, we had decide to go at the most southern corner of Attican lands. To the region of Lavreotiki.In the hills located few km before the main town is Thoriko. There we visit the remains of its Ancient theatre which is one of the oldest in Ancient Hellenic world. Next to it, we saw the sign for a Mycenaean tomb. The road to it is not well-preserved and i`m pretty sure during winter time, without the proper equipment it will be really difficult to visit it as its some distance walking upwards to the hill. We finally found the tomb. It doesn`t suprized me that it was not in a good shape. There was a basic contruction works to it, but it seems that was not enough as in the region there is always heavy rainfall during autumn and winter. After the tomb we noticed some "strange" rocks looked not like part of the hill but more like someone placed them there. Ruins of an archaic Acropolis? Who knows...for sure looked like a place taken from a Robert Howard novel. Impressively similar! As there was not any path to the top of this hill, we had to do something between walk and climbing amongst thorny bushes and sharp rocks to reach it. And so we did!

Here you can see photos from the theatre, the tomb, the ruins(?) in the top of this hill and the view of the whole area from it.